


Safekeeping

by AwaitTheMorrow



Category: Teen Wolf (TV)
Genre: Adulthood, Alternate Universe - Human, Anal Sex, Communication Failure, F/F, Getting Back Together, Idiots in Love, Lack of Communication, M/M, Makeup Sex, Mild Smut, Post-Break Up, Returning Home, Reunions, Snark, Unconventional Families, Weddings
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-05-04
Updated: 2018-05-17
Packaged: 2019-05-02 04:10:16
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 17,412
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14536335
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/AwaitTheMorrow/pseuds/AwaitTheMorrow
Summary: It's been eleven months, one week and three days since Derek has last seen Stiles after they called it quits. Not that Derek is counting or anything.Derek reluctantly goes home to Beacon Hills for his sisters' wedding and keeps running into the one man he'd been hoping to avoid at all costs.He can totally be a mature adult about this.





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

  * For [AJenno](https://archiveofourown.org/users/AJenno/gifts).



> Written for AJenno and their prompt of Sterek second chances. I took a couple of liberties with it but I hope you like it xoxo

Derek arrives back into Beacon Hills on a sweltering Saturday afternoon. It's mid-July and the air is sticky and stifling, sauna-like and near unbearable. Sweat beads on his brow and his shirt sticks uncomfortably to his back even in the climate-controlled vehicle he’s been driving in for the past four hours. Pausing for just a moment to bask in the air-conditioning of his car, Derek inhales slowly through his nose to centre himself, mentally saying goodbye to his solitude for the next few days. His childhood home towers before him - he hasn't been home in months, but it always looks just as he remembers it, frozen in time in the way it is tall but inviting, the delicate clang of the porch wind-chimes swept by the breeze makes him feel like no time has passed at all.

As soon as he steps out of his car he is instantly swept into his mother’s long, spindly arms, her wavy hair presses into his mouth as she sways them side-to-side.

“Welcome home, bubby.”

“Hey Mamma-bear,” Derek greets into her neck, arms around her waist. Once his mother untangles herself and takes a step back she grins widely, wordlessly raising her hands to tug his earlobes in a gentle, familiar gesture. She tilts her head towards the house and then single-handedly takes both his suitcases into her strong hands, stubbornly refusing to let Derek carry his own belongings into the house despite his protests. At least managing to swing the duffle over his shoulder and feeling none-too-useful, Derek takes a deep breath of the ever-present scent of the white sage incense as he enters, looks to see that sure enough, there's a half-burned stick on the hall stand, thin tendrils of smoke clouding the threshold.

His mom moves quickly throughout the halls, bracelets jingling together as she wanders upstairs to deposit Dereks' bags in his old bedroom. Not a thing looks out of place at all from where he stands.

“Where's Dad?” Derek calls out, making his way to the kitchen, automatically aiming for the fridge for something to snack on.

“Manning the shop,” she replies, sneaking up from behind him to grab a pitcher of pineapple juice.

Talia Hale has owned and operated _Hales Holistic_ since it's conception twenty-seven years ago. What started out as a small, kitschy practice that provided services like reiki and reflexology quickly grew into a bonafide wellness centre that encompassed many forms of alternative medicine and had its' own range of organic, hand-made items. Derek couldn't begin to count the hours he’d spent in the shop growing up, it was a second home by now with its rustic vibe, noisy cash register and the steady flow of customers. When he’d got old enough he was able to help out in the shop after school, it being his first real job.

“You're open on Saturday's now?” Derek asks, grabbing two glasses from the cabinet and setting them on the bench with a _clink_.

His mother tuts as she fills the glasses with the juice. “All my kids leave the nest, gotta fill my time somehow.”

“You could like, I don't know, relax, maybe. Travel or knit or whatever it is people do after their prime.”

“Take up lawn bowls or something?” She smirks into her glass.

“I was thinking bingo.”

“Hold up now, let's not get too outrageous,” she gasps, leaning against the kitchen bench before a comfortable silence falls between them. Derek takes this moment to assess the kitchen before him, how nothing at all has changed in the months between now and the last time he was here. The mosaic fruit bowl is in the same position, clock still ticking loudly on the far corner wall closest to the fridge, the same tiny terracotta pots on the windowsill growing basil and thyme.

“You're looking better,” she remarks softly, reaching out stroke his forehead with her hand.

“Ma.”

“What? Just sayin'.”

“You're always just saying.”

She smiles brightly, the crows feet around her eyes deepening with the action. “I'm always right, too, but I never hear you bring it up.”

Derek rolls his eyes and downs the rest of his juice before placing his glass in the sink. “I'll get right on that,” he drawls. “Whats for dinner?”

“You're home for all of three seconds and we're back to _Ma, what's for dinner_?”

“I drove four hours to get here. I'm tired and hungry _._ Feed me please.”

“Who’s gonna feed _me_?” His mother laughs, placing her hands on her hips. 

“Four hours,” Derek repeats, widening his eyes.

“You're such a manipulative little shit, Derek,” his mother sighs fondly. “You get that from me. God, I missed you.”

Derek leans forward and kisses her temple, her hair brushing against his cheek. “Missed you too.”

\------

For all of his intentions and effort, Derek never anticipated being back in Beacon Hills so soon. Having left without looking back years ago he'd had zero intention of returning to the small town unless there was a birth, death or marriage.

Either fate (or his younger sister) had a poor sense of timing and humour because here he was, homebound and stuck for the rest of the week – although, that being said, he supposes he should count himself lucky that it was only marriage that brought him back instead of death - with his run of luck, anyway.

The call to home came in the form of a surprising announcement that his youngest sister, Cora, was getting married to her on-again-off-again girlfriend – an intimidatingly intelligent redhead by the name of Lydia Martin. The two women had gone to high-school together where the story was born, a dramatic tale of hate at first sight. When asked to recount their first meeting, both women will agree on one thing only: they started off on the wrong foot in a biology class - however eventually transcended from sworn enemies to sweethearts. Lydia says Cora messed up their rat dissection on purpose and Cora says her hand slipped. Ever since then it has been a tumultuous roller-coaster of break-ups and make-ups that Derek has failed to keep up with.

Having been witness to more than one fall-out Derek didn't think they'd make it past high school. They definitely seemed to care for each other and surely had the type of chemistry that others may envy, but they'd seemed so volatile and prone to eruption. Despite his predictions, it seems like no matter how far apart their paths took them, from different colleges and careers, the two had a magnetic pull that drew them back to each other. Derek didn't even know that Cora planned to propose at all until Cora changed her Facebook status to "Engaged." 

Derek is happy for them, really. Kind of. Okay so, no one is ever going to be good enough to take care of his baby sister, but he will concede Lydia knows Cora well enough and wants the best for her. Probably.

The morning after he arrives is less stifling, cloud-free and a pale blue. Rocking gently on the porch swing Derek mulls over the upcoming days, homemade iced coffee clutched in one hand, the other stroking Bastet, the plump family cat. There are seven days until the wedding and up until one week ago, he had meticulously planned to arrive in Beacon Hills the night before the ceremony and leave at first light the morning after.

Well, that was until Cora’s friend-slash-bridesmaid had got into a terrible accident whilst BMX riding, breaking a leg and _both_ arms. The friend would be fine and live to tell the tale of her “gnarly” crash but minutes after visiting her in hospital Cora had called Derek, voice brimming with nerves, anxiously asking for his help. Help that would dash his plans entirely.

If anyone asks, Derek will lie through his teeth until he is blue in the face; he at first was hesitant - or well, y'know - downright resistant to do much more than show up as a ghost-like guest, aiming to be brief and near invisible. But truthfully, despite his lack of love for Lydia and his outright aversion to Beacon Hills he was helpless to say no to Cora. Her voice had trembled and gotten smaller the longer she spoke, stressed and scared all at once - and nothing or nobody except him is allowed to make his family sound like that.

And that's how Derek got roped in to being his sisters bridesmaid.

Or, well, bridesman. Brideboy? No, that doesn't sound right either. Anyway, he has forthwith abandoned his dignity and free will in the pursuit of his sisters happiness for the remainder of the week.

Good times.

All of his persistent misgivings about the entire thing dissipate when Cora stops by their parents house the next morning, the grin that spreads over her face when she sees him is as rewarding as is the tight hug she wraps him up in upon sight.

“Hello stranger,” she mumbles into his neck, smelling like the perfume she steals from Lydia. “How you been?”

Arms squeezed tightly around her waist, he replies, “Good. Missed you.”

“Missed you too, asshole,” Cora sniffs, punching his arm as they disentangle from the embrace. “When’d you get in?”

“Last night,” Derek says, leading her into the kitchen to make tea and flicking the switch on the kettle. Cora lifts herself to sit on the messy kitchen bench and pokes Derek’s stomach with her toe as he’s fishing out mugs and their mothers’ self-made teabags from the wood cupboards.

“You look better,” she says.

Derek blinks innocently. “Than you? Yeah I know.”

“Don’t be rude, I’m a _bride_ ,” she says glibly, poking out her tongue.

“You’re a brat,” Derek corrects, pouring the water into the mugs after it hits boiling point, steam rises up to heat his fingers as he jostles the bags. “Are you nervous?”

She shrugs, swinging her legs to-and-fro accepting the tea from her brother. “Not really? Everything’s been handled, there’s nothing left to worry about.”

“And Lydia?”

Sipping her tea before answering, Cora replies, “She seems okay. She’s planned everything down to the last detail so, I can’t really see anything going wrong.”

“Of course she did,” Derek mutters, rolling his eyes.

Cora kicks him again this time on his thigh dangerously close to his groin, making him wince. “Don’t,” she warns. “I know you’re not her biggest fan, but this week you have to be, okay? Put aside your hate for just one week.”

A funny sort of guilt creeps up on him like dirty hands on his skin, pressing in and settling there, depositing grime. He sniffs the herbal scented tea and says defensively, “I don’t _hate_ her.”

“Uh-huh.”

“I don’t. Her family is another story though.”

His sister snorts, rolling her neck around. “No shit, man. You’re lucky you’re not the one marrying into it.”

Derek tries to pull his mouth into a smirk, but his smug veneer short-circuits when something in his stomach goes sour and rapidly rots. Instead, drains the remainder of his tea into the sink. “Yeah.”

“Hey, I didn’t mean --”

“It’s fine,” Derek interrupts and waving his hand just in time for their dad to enter the kitchen carrying their cat, scratching behind its ears. Bastet, all fat and grey, meows loudly upon sight of the siblings, flicking his tail up in a lazy curve to stroke their fathers neck.

“Hello children,” their father greets, stroking down the length of the cats back in what looks like a cheesy impersonation of a cartoon villain. “Fancy meeting you here.”

“Good morning my queen,” Cora bows her head, raising her mug to their father. Derek rolls his eyes at their antics, placing a couple pieces of homemade bread in the toaster. Bastet wriggles out of their dads hold and pads his way over to Derek, purrs vibrating throughout his body when he winds himself around Derek’s legs.

The nichrome wire within the toaster glows a hot red-orange when Derek stares at it, willing the appliance to go faster so he can slip away back up to his room. It’s kind of funny how he is instantly able to regress to some younger version of himself by virtue of being in a different house. In his own home, Derek is the adult, the go-to. Here he feels like he’s still sixteen and moody, happily left alone to shrug off the illusion of having his life together.

“I’m going to need a volunteer. Laura just called,” their dad said, taking an apple from the mosaic fruit bowl on the dining table. “Her flight’s coming in at five, so --”

“But the dinner’s at six,” Cora interrupts. She doesn’t seem too put out when she says, “I can’t, I have to pick up Lydia and her parents.”

“Dinner?” Derek asks, confused, “what dinner?”

“It’s just a wedding thing,” Cora says, flapping a hand in his direction, ignoring his grimace and general vibe of disdain. “You’re coming too. Laura can just catch an Uber.”

“The airport is on the other side of the city,” their father chides. “I’ve already told her someone will be there to pick her up and your mother and I are helping set up.”

“I’ll do it,” Derek grumbles. Even though there is really no one else but him that can do it - despite the pretence of choice - he thinks that maybe a drive will do some good for the itch that’s already starting to furrow beneath his skin, the one that nags at him whenever he is stopped still too long. Besides, he hasn’t seen Laura for months.

“Good man,” their dad says as Derek’s toast pops. “Bridezilla, you’re coming with me to the farmers market today.”

Cora seems visibly displeased by the moniker, much to Derek’s childish satisfaction. With her hands occupied with the mug she points an accusing toe at their dad. “I am _not_ a bridezilla - and I don’t even live here anymore!”

Derek crosses his arms over his chest as he tilts his head to the side, assessing her with mock seriousness. “Hmm, maybe not a Bridezilla. Bridezora maybe?”

“Cora the Bridezora?” His dad asks.

Derek nods affirmatively.

“I hate you both,” she mutters. “Fine, but we are not taking your old chevy to the market.”

\---

  
The bulk of the day is spent reading on the porch while the cat walks back and forth on Derek's stomach and gardening with his mother, donning an old pair of gloves and pulling out weeds, sweating in the relentless sun. It’s not overly warm today but the rays are bright and the wind is sparse. He’s had to take an antihistamine already, the pollen at this time of year wreaking havoc on his allergies and causing his eyes and nose to itch and turn an unattractive shade of red.

Every time he comes home he tries to be a better son, tells himself that this time it will be him that carries out the pitcher of ice water to his mom but she always gets there before him, condensation dripping down the glass or a plate of sandwiches already made and halved perfectly. She’s never been the most conventional parent, outspoken, laid-back and free-spirited -- when Derek was growing up the kids used to refer to the Hales as “ _that hippy family_ ”, which wasn’t entirely inaccurate, but it took on a new meaning the older he got. As an adult and, depending on who he was speaking to, the word hippy became a little darker, whispered in the same context as _communist_ or something equally stupid like, wacky liberal. His parents _were_ progressive liberals, however it wasn’t always well received by the greater population of Beacon Hills which was one of the few red spots in California.

It didn’t stop people from loving the wellness centre though.  _Hales Holistic_ was always booked out for their health services, crystals and essential oils selling out as if it were the end of times and people desperately needed lavender. Despite their reputation the Hales were as much of a staple in the quiet town as any other bedrock family. Derek wouldn’t trade his upbringing for the world, though. He loved his parents and his sisters - sometimes.

Later in the afternoon he takes a shower and picks out something neat-casual to wear, knowing that he isn’t going to have time to go home and change after picking Laura up from the airport. He settles on a dark grey button-up and dark jeans, battling the whole way with a particularly urge need to be able to blend in and avoid scrutiny, not sure what can of worms will be opened tonight.

When he begins driving to the airport he finds that the feeling doesn’t go away as quickly or as much as he’d like it to. Nerves gnaws into his stomach like a scurrying rat the further he drives. It’s stupid, but he does his best to put it aside though, turning up the music loudly in the car and focusing on getting to the airport in one piece.

The line to the carpark is long and Derek sits in the queue waiting for an available space for a long time. Like this morning with Cora, the hug that Laura gives him when he collects her from the Beacon West Airport arrivals terminal is both warm and enveloping, perfectly on the side of squeezing too tight.

“Thanks for picking me up,” Laura says softly, ruffling his hair. It’s been months since he’s seen her but like all timeless elements of their family, she still wears her ponytail exactly the same way and dons the very same second-hand military green jacket she’s worn since high school. It’s unexpectedly comforting.

Grabbing her suitcase by the handle, Derek directs her out of the bright, busy terminal and begins the walk back to where he parked his car. “No problem. I had to get out of the house anyway,” he shrugs.

Laura’s shoulders slump exaggeratedly as if they were pushed down by a terrible weight. “Man,” she groans, “how is it being back at the house? Are mom and dad driving you crazy yet?”

“It’s been like, one day,” Derek said laughing, shaking his head.

“Still. They drive me crazy from across the country. Do you know how many calls I’ve had from mom this week? Eight. Eight!”

“Mom and dad are fine, it’s Cora you have to watch out for.”

They reach his car in the furthest parking lot and stow away Laura’s belongings and hit the road again, his sister hijacking his sound system with her playlist, free to chop-and-change songs as she pleases -  Derek doesn’t mind though, it’s nice to have the company. As it is the freeway is relatively quiet at the late hour of the early evening, and if the clock on his dash is anything to go by, they’re going to make it to the dinner without being too outside of time. Fashionably late, Lydia would call it. She should approve, right?

“I cannot believe Cora is getting married,” Laura says quietly, gazing out the passenger window. Derek looks over to her as she smiles to herself in disbelief.

“It’s weird,” Derek agrees. “Life’s gone so damn fast.”

“Right? I can’t help but think of her as that gap-toothed kid who broke her arm jumping off the slide. Now she’s getting married - and before us!”

“What part offends you more,” Derek drawls, turning on his signal to take the off-ramp out of the freeway, “the fact that time got away from you, or the fact that your baby sister is getting married before you?”

“Both,” she says honestly. “Life did _not_ go the way I planned it.”

“No kidding. Your entire high school career you said you were going to be a corporate lawyer and make big bucks.”

“And now I’m a sex-therapist, but still making the bucks,” Laura grins. “God, I can’t wait to introduce myself to Lydia’s extended family like that. Hi, I’m Laura, I’m thirty-one, single and childless, and I like talking about sex. Can you imagine their reactions?”

Snorting softly, Derek rolls his eyes at her, trying to store some of the humour away from the situation. He’s sure it’s the single-and-childless part of the whole sentence that will be the most risqué to Lydia’s conservative, traditional family. While he’s been imagining the showdown between Laura and the in-laws, the unease from before has begun crawling up his spine, digging its nails into his vertebrae, convincing his heart to beat a little faster.  
  
A restless hush falls over them between one upbeat indie tune to another. The itch continues to needle up his spine and into his throat, persistent in trying to make it outside of his body.

“Laura?”

“Yeah?”

“...Do you think he’ll be there?” Derek asks quietly as they pass the Beacon Hills welcome sign some time later.

“Stiles?” Laura asks. “He’s Lydia’s step-brother, isn’t he? Safe to say he’ll probably be front and centre.”

“Fantastic,” Derek mutters as they pull up to the restaurant, the only one with French cuisine in the entire town. He parks his car in what seems to be the only available spot left, a theme of the day apparently, crowded with what is sure to be Lydia’s extensive family and turns off the engine a little forcefully.

Laura looks over to him and touches his elbow lightly, nails chipped bright blue. “Are you two going to be civil? Will you need an umpire?”

“Don’t worry, Stiles and I will be civil,” he assures her confidently. “We’ve moved on.”

  
\---

  
Inside, the Hales greet Derek and welcome Laura home with raucous cheering and back-slapping hugs. Their mother appears to be on her third glass of wine if the way their dad is imitating chugging back a glass is any indication, that and the way she pinches Laura’s butt when she hugs her.

“My beautiful girl,” she smiles, pulling back and ignoring Laura’s embarrassed protests.

Derek slips away from the commotion and finds Cora and Lydia at their table where they are politely conversing with their respective grandparents, greeting them with a hug and kiss. The only Hale grandparent that is present and alive is his grandma Betty, short and slightly deaf, rocking a bright red lipstick all the same. Cora looks beautiful in a slim-fitting black dress, hair gelled back in a tight ponytail, holding a glass of white wine in one hand. Lydia looks very pretty too, she always does, holding Coras free hand, her engagement ring - a Hale heirloom - practically dripping from her pale finger.

Once the pleasantries are thankfully out of the way, he tries finds himself a seat in the tightly packed restaurant. There doesn’t appear to be much by the way of table seats, unless he wants to be seated next to Lydia’s great aunt or sit at the toddlers table, which he absolutely does not. He spies an a couple of empty stools at the bar, which is kind of a bonus really, and quickly heads over, slipping onto one of the stools that doesn’t have a jacket covering it.

“Is this seat taken?” He asks a dark-haired woman sitting next to him, illuminated by the blue lights above them. She peers up from where she is cradling an amber glass of what smells like fireball whisky and shakes her head, dimples indenting her cheeks when she smiles.

“No, you’re fine,” she says.

“Thanks.”

“Which bride are you here for?”

“Cora. You here with Lydia’s family?”

“Sort of,” she replies, swilling the liquid around in her cup. “I’m here with --”

“Well, _look_ who it is,” loudly remarks a familiar voice. Derek’s stomach drops like a stone, cold washing over him as Stiles Stilinski, tall and pale, rounds the bar and takes the free seat on the other side of the dark-haired woman. “Fancy seeing you here.”

“Hitler,” Derek greets.

“Satan,” Stiles returns, with a nod, indicating to the bartender with a raised hand.

Without Derek’s permission, his eyes furtively rake over Stiles’ form, taking in the fresh-outta-bed tousled hair, the dress pants and shirt that form around his figure, the red tie hanging loosely from his neck.

“Almost didn't recognize you without the patchy facial hair and combover,” Derek notes casually, shrugging off his blazer and rolling up the sleeves of his shirt.

Stiles laughs woodenly as the bartender pours him some kind of dark beer. “Guess that's your age showing – your eyes start playing up, you know?”

“Bad eyesight, huh. Guess that explains your outfit then.”

“Or what I ever saw in you,” Stiles replies cheerily, “but hey, we're all works in progress, right?”

The woman between them makes a strange squeaking noise into her hand, turning to look at Stiles with wide eyes. The harsh, guarded expression on Stiles face - the one Derek hates - softens significantly when he looks at the woman, catching her gaze and holding it. The way she inches slightly closer to Stiles and the loaded stare when he looks at her makes Derek realize with a strange, floaty feeling that they must be there _together_. Like together, together. Jaw set, Derek flags down the bartender for a strong drink of his own, only feeling slightly better when he can clutch the glass around his hands like a lifeline, thankful for something to do with his hands. There's a weird sort of buzzing around his ribs when he thinks of how quickly Stiles must have moved on.

“You two know each other?” She asks as an awkward quiet falls around them.

Both men snort into their glasses.

“I’m Derek,” he introduces himself. “I was Stiles’ big gay experiment.”

The girl blinks at him, visibly trying to hide a smile as she bites her lip “Oh I see. So you two used to date?”

“Something like that,” Stiles says blithely.

“It was less dating and more like babysitting,” Derek corrects, leaning back and crossing his ankle over his knee. He absently wonders if his family can see any of this happening and if one of them, for the love of god, could save him from this unwanted reunion. It’s been eleven months since he’s heard anything more than a text or drunken voicemail, let alone seen his face.

“Babysitting, huh. Is that why you broke up?”

Derek’s about to change the subject or tell her to mind her own business when Stiles opens his big mouth. “Well,” Stiles cuts in, abrupt as always, fingers skittering across the bench top, “turns out all along that I was Derek's' mistress, and that he was married to his job.”

“Really?” Derek asks incredulously, “I thought it had to do with the fact that you invited your whole family into our relationship.”

Stiles hums thoughtfully. “No, I'm pretty sure it was your failure in commitment. Although, to be fair, you calling my grandmother a conniving wench wasn't a real highlight of our time together.”

“Funny, I thought her repeatedly walking in on us having sex to ask if we'd seen her _PedEgg_ was some of the better times of our relationship.”

“No, it was just another of the many disappointing aspects of our time together, Derek,” Stiles assures him feigned indifference. "Talk about not being able to finish, am I right?"

“You're heartbroken, I’m sure,” Derek mutters, downing his glass in one go.

“Eh, so-so. It wasn’t all for nothing though, I learned that I was ambidextrous after all,” Stiles winks at his date, “But I'm sure he's improved in the – how long has it been since we broke up, Derek?”

“Not long enough.”

Stiles flicks his eyes deliberately down to Derek’s crotch and back up again. “Definitely not long enough. You’d know all about that, wouldn’t you?”

The woman laughs nervously, clearing her throat for the third time that minute. Derek sighs and texts an SOS from his phone to Laura, relaxing only minutely when he hears the telltale stomp of her boots a few moments later, standing up and slapping money down on the bar.

“As usual, Stiles, it's hardly been a pleasure.”

“Aww heck, Derek,” Stiles pouts. “You finishing early again?”

“Like most of the men in your life, I'm just eager to get it over and done with,” Derek says before fixing his gaze onto the petite woman besides Stiles and smiles kindly. “I wouldn't expect much of Stiles tonight. He's not usually... _up_ for much after he drinks.”

Stiles flips him off, mouth gaping in irritation.

Derek slips out of his seat and follows Laura back into the crowd, turning back to bid them a dry, “Goodnight!”, willing every traitorous cell in his body to not turn back around to look at the man he finds himself walking away from again.

Time passes strangely after that, both too fast and excruciatingly slow. Derek stays for the first round of cheers and tipsy speeches before excusing himself for the night, over all of the commotion already and well aware that no one will notice him gone anyway. Whether or not she’s being truthful Derek doesn’t know, but Laura declares she is tired from travelling all day and drives him back to the house.  
  
She doesn’t say anything about the tightness in his jaw or the way he doesn’t stop fiddling with his phone on the entire drive home, but she reaches out and rubs circles on his back with a comforting hand when they head back inside the house. She regales him with the tale of how she introduced herself to Lydia’s ultra conservative uncle as someone who works in “the sex industry” and the shade of pale that his skin turned. It's the best fun she's had all week, she says, lamenting how hard it is to find prudes in her line of work.

 

\----

 

Despite growing up in the same town and having dating siblings, their social circles and age differences meant that Stiles and Derek didn’t really meet for a long time, not until they attended the same out of town college a few hours hours south of Beacon Hills. They had sort of known of each other in passing, sometimes seeing one another across town, but mostly any knowledge came from vague anecdotes and from their sisters' blurry snapchats.

Derek has been in his second year at college, squirrelled away in his dorm and studying diligently on his quest to become a physiotherapist. It had helped him to think of the insurmountable volume of exams and assignments as such, studying like getting XP to level up. He was an RPG nerd, okay? One night his roommate had convinced him to go to a party that a friend of his was having at a nearby frat house. It was the Friday before Spring Break and Derek had figured most people would be heading home anyway for the break so it couldn't possibly be too busy, and he was eager to get out of their room, so he’d agreed.

Sometime later during the alcohol soaked festivities Stiles had parked himself on the couch that Derek was desperately trying to sink into. The long lines of Stiles' body had pressed warmly into Derek's side as they competed for space with other guests and he'd looked over to Derek with dark, interested eyes and said brightly,  _“Hey man, don’t I know you?”_

Ten minutes later Derek had his pants around his thighs and was receiving the best blowjob of his life in a strangers bathroom, music blaring around them - and the rest was history.

It was easier for Derek to think of their relationship in the most flippant of ways - a quickie, a consecutive series of impulsive decisions, a young-and-dumb mistake. If he were to think of it as anything else, like a young-and-dumb mistake that lasted for three and a half years, it might make him regret the time that he’d spent on it. If he were to think of it like a young-and-dumb mistake when they moved in together after they both graduated, he might start to think about all of the plans they’d made and never fulfilled in bed together at night, in drives across highways with hands clasped together over the gearstick of Derek’s car.

He tries not to think about it at all.

The day after the dinner Derek wakes up slightly hungover, mouth tasting sour and chalky. Laura had broken into their parents stash of wine when they’d gotten home and finished two bottles of red between them, talking and catching up on the last few months of their lives. He was well and truly buzzed when he crawled up to his childhood bedroom, falling asleep soundly still in his jeans.

He has to be fitted for a suit today for the wedding ceremony. The original suit he was to wear as a guest apparently wasn’t going to cut it as an official member of the bridal party. Really, Derek was more than happy to sink into the background in his regular suit but he was reminded by both Lydia and Cora that they weren’t paying for a big, beautiful ceremony only to have Derek’s ill-fitting linens stick out like a sore thumb. Hungover and chafing a little, Derek would rather not have someone prod and poke at him while his being surrounded by his ex-boyfriends family, who will become his in-laws anyway. What's with that? What a crappy twist of fate, to lose the relationship but to keep the unwanted family. His life, ladies and gentlemen.

Whatever internal struggle Derek is facing, he dutifully plays big brother and endures the seamstress at the boutique store who has wandering hands and sharp pins and manicured nails that pinch at his skin. Cora is off with an employee in another room having last minute alterations made to her dress. Unfortunately for Derek, Cora’s departure meant that he was stuck with Lydia and her entourage, consisting of her best friend and three family members, all whom are studiously observing the proceedings.

“Such a shame, what happened to Cora’s friend,” Lydia’s mother laments from the sofa where she is watching Derek becoming a living mannequin. “She seemed so full of life.”

“She’s not _dead_ ,” Lydia rolls her eyes. “She’s still coming as a guest to the ceremony.”

“I thought she was in a coma,” someone else mentions.

“What? No. That was your soap opera, Aunt Rosemary, remember?”

“Are you sure?”

“Yes,” Lydia sighs. “We made sure there was wheelchair access to the front row of the pews. Keep up.”

“Still,” an older woman adds, “having a male bridesmaid is very unconventional, even for you and Cora,” she says as if Derek isn’t even there.

“So what,” Lydia drawls, closing her eyes in what Derek can see is clearly some overdue frustration. The muscle in her jaw seems to twitch when two of the ladies start speaking over one another to get their point across.

There was zero shortage of truth when he’d mentioned the invasive and somewhat overbearing nature of the Stilinski-Martin family to Stiles’ date the night before. For all of their rigidity and uppityness they were an animated, passionate family - incredibly close-knit and with little by way of boundaries. Where Derek grew up in an open environment, his parents harboured the philosophy that was a little more free-range, he'd never felt pressured by them for anything. Any request for privacy was upheld and respected if their values of openness and integrity were otherwise maintained. It was something of a rude shock when he’d discovered that kind of lax approach was very much not the case with his then-boyfriends family. Their style of family interaction couldn't be more different, as where their ideas of respect and expectation. While Derek was never coaxed into anything by his family it was immediately apparent that Stiles had had an entirely different childhood. From the way he dressed to what he studied, it seemed like everything was fair game to criticism and opinion in Stiles life, getting both despite never asking for it.

It didn't just end with Stiles. From the first time he’d officially met them during a family dinner, after being grilled about his aspirations for after college, Stiles grandparents had essentially declared Derek as not being good enough for their grandson. Oh, they didn’t say it outright to begin with - it started as snide, cutting comments about Derek being a glorified masseuse and, over time, eventually devolved into blatantly stating that he would be holding Stiles back in his studies and wasn’t it time that Derek moved on? Stiles and his father, John, had seemed apologetic at first for their family’s behavior but couldn’t stop what they’d said when neither of them were around.

Derek was fine with it at the time, mostly, he could handle some old crones talking shit about him when they didn’t really know him and didn’t feel the need to prove himself or win their approval in any way. He’d come too far in his own self-esteem battle to let them touch the well-guarded sides of his spirit. What had hurt the most, however, was the unexplained and gradual decline in the way Stiles would defend him to them. It wasn't that Derek needed someone to fight his battles but it was like maybe Stiles started to believe what they were saying too. Maybe that for all Derek had loved him, he’d never compete with family.

“I’m just saying,” the older woman interjects, pointing at Derek, “if you’re happy to have the man who broke your brothers heart standing up there on the most important day of your life --”

Wait, what?

“That’s enough,” Lydia scolds, standing up and making fervent zipping motions with her fingers over her mouth. “I love you - but for the love of god, would you mind your own business for once?”

Head swimming, Derek shoots Lydia a grateful smile which she returns quietly, dipping her head. The chatter sticks to safer topics like flower arrangements and honeymoon plans, allowing Derek to zone out and release some of the tension between his shoulders. During the remainder of the fitting Derek stays quiet and pliable, even when Cora returns from her appointment, unable to stop repeating the words in mind over and over.

What on earth gave them the impression that it was Derek who broke Stiles heart and not the other way around?

He perks up enough when he and Cora go to leave, but doesn’t miss the appraising looks she sends him on the drive back home - and if he's being honest, it’s one of many good reasons why he hasn’t been back here in so long. Avoidance and distraction has given Derek some much required breathing space, but without the buffer of distance he’s back to being neck-deep in the shit he’s been running away from for so long. All that he can do until he leaves for Sacramento is to wade in it until it’s over. The shift in mood makes him feel like a terrible brother, he should be nothing but happy and supportive for Cora - he doesn’t want to ruin this for her - but everything dredged up feels too close to the surface.

When he gets home Derek wearily joins his dad on the couch in the living room, slumping down and placing his socked feet on the table. Some kind of upbeat, British cooking show is playing, an intimidating tower of golden pastry upon the screen in high definition.

“What’s that?” Derek asks, marginally intrigued.

“A croquembouche,” his dad replies.

“Ah.”

“How was the fitting?”

Derek shrugs, watching as a chef drizzles strands of toffee over the pastry pyramid. “S’fine.”

He can feel the weight of his dads eyes over as they scan him, but Derek keeps his stare affixed to the screen. Wordlessly, his dad hands over a plate of peanut butter brownies to Derek who accepts one gratefully.

“Take a couple,” his dad encourages. Derek shakes his head, swallowing his mouthful.

“I just got fitted into an eight hundred dollar suit. I have to wear it in five days and not burst the seams.”

“Like you’re not going to burn all of the calories in stress this week anyway.”

“...Fine,” Derek mumbles, accepting the plate back from his dad, warmed a little. They spend the rest of the evening watching cooking show after cooking show, eating brownies and drinking milk and maybe Derek is imagining it, but it helps him feel a little less empty.

  
\----

 

It’s always been Derek’s dream to help people.

All his life he only ever wanted to make people feel and do better, and growing up around his family at the wellness centre only ever cultivated that. He’d loved seeing returned clients doing better and leaving with a smile on their face, radiating hope and feeling more empowered. He knew he always wanted to enter into a  health profession and he'd developed a focus during his school years - and he’d never really wavered in his vision since.

The concept of wanting to genuinely help people is one of the things that he and Stiles had had in common, in spite all of their glaring differences. When they were both in a little younger and overflowing with unfulfilled dreams and idealism, they would talk at lengths at where they wanted their education to take them, how they could shape all of their options and choices into the life they’d wanted to lead. They truly felt like all they wanted was within their grasp.  
  
In college, cramped together on a single bed, Derek would close his eyes and describe in detail how his best version of his future would look - he would be working with patients who really needed his help, who were down on their luck maybe. He’d heard plenty of horror stories from other med students of patients who exaggerate their pain or abused the system, but Derek was sure that it was never going to be him. He wasn't going to sit around complaining about his patients and regard all of their pain dubiously.

Stiles too, tracing along Derek’s chest with his long fingers would speak in flowy, articulate volumes of the blueprint he had for his life. Despite entering law school at the pressure of his family, he was going to transfer to study criminology or maybe into forensics! _How cool would that be, Derek!_

It was cool, hearing the vivid details in near purple prose how Stiles was going to carve out this life for himself and chase his dreams, how he was strong and capable enough to shrug off family expectations, how he was going to do anything he wanted, just for himself. It was cool, planning how they would both move to Sacramento or San Francisco after college and go to the beach on the weekends and travel during the summer, maybe move somewhere where they could get a pet and cook together in something that wasn’t a tiny kitchen. They had a lot of plans.

It’s less cool standing in the reception area of a red brick building, a small law firm with a dated, peeling sign that reads: “Stilinski & Stilinski”. It was decidedly uncool watching Stiles work from behind an old desk in a tired suit, a beat up desktop computer illuminating his face, making him look sickly.

Turns out that for all his fervent enthusiasm and good intentions Stiles fell upon the sword of family expectation easier than what he had realized. The practice was run by Stiles’ grandfather and uncle on his mother's side and he fit right in just like they planned. Stiles had been offered a position as soon as he’d moved back to Beacon Hills, glibly announcing it to Derek the last time they had spoken like he’d wanted it all along.  
  
Derek had tried to be happy for him at the time, but he’d still been mostly incredibly angry. He was hurt that Stiles had seemed to move on so easily when Derek could barely get out of bed most mornings and drag himself to a job that he hated - because for all of Derek’s late night whispers and visions, he himself didn’t have the guts to chase his own dream either, accepting a job for some varsity sports team that made him feel excluded and untethered.

He’s here to drop off lunch for Cora, who is here on business to tune up her Will at the request of their families. Meticulous and stubborn as both Stiles and Cora are, it’s taking them hours to iron out and finalize all of the nitty gritty details. It’s a macabre prospect to even think about as she is so young, however it’s probably necessary, Derek reasons, now that she’s getting married. Anything can happen, after all - if their lives are anything to show for it, it proves that nothing turns out the way you plan. Fate’s design seems to be made by playing darts in the dark.

Derek knocks lightly on the cubicle wall, carrying a bag of take-out over to her and ignoring the way his heart stomps itself against his chest when Stiles looks up at him. Derek doesn’t acknowledge him, not interested in engaging in their barbs today. Instead he squeezes his sisters shoulder when she thanks him for his efforts, turning to leave when he hears Stiles sarcastically croak from behind him:

“What? Not even a hello?”

Derek blinks and looks around the room. “Did you hear something, Cora?” he asks innocently. Keeping his back turned he sticks his middle finger up high and walks out, wishing it made him feel better.

Stiles uncle glares at Derek on the way out, a frown deepening the lines on his weathered face. Derek doesn’t want to give him the satisfaction of reacting, and ignores him with his head held high. It’s only when he gets back to the safety of his car that he slumps, his back bowing forward with exertion. It’s times like these he wishes he had a pet or a partner for some company that isn’t his family. He has friends back in Sacramento, Erica and Boyd, but he doesn’t want to bother them about this, they don’t really know anything about this part of his life and he’d be damned to want to bring it up. God knows he doesn't have his best friend anymore.

Derek starts the car and goes for another long, long drive. He can't begin to lose it now, he needs to keep himself together for just a few more days until he can go home. All he has to do is avoid Stiles at all costs. The town isn't huge but it's big enough to get lost in for Derek hopes to not have to have another confrontation with Stiles - he should be fine.

 

\----

He runs into Stiles again on Wednesday afternoon at the coffee shop on Main Street. Derek’s sitting at a table and distracted by his phone, stuck in his thoughts when Stiles brushes past him in the crowded shop to reach the counter. In his surprise, Derek startles and tips over his mug, hot coffee spilling with a glug. It burns him a little when he tries to clean it up quickly, a bit embarrassed by the commotion, when he hears Stiles snicker at him nearby.

"Good job," Stiles mutters.

“Fuck off,” Derek scowls, looking up at the man waiting in line to order, hands shoved casually in his pockets, knee jiggling up and down. That damn inability to stay still used to be cute - now it was fucking annoying.

“Yeah I’ll get right on that. Dumbass.”

“Asshole.”

“Hmm, that’s good one,” Stiles says sarcastically. "I prefer to call you 'fuckup' though."

Something in Derek snaps.

“Yeah? What about ‘cunt’?” Derek asks dryly, the coffee shop going quiet around them, a loud gasp echoing from one of the patrons.

Derek doesn’t bother with the remainder of his coffee before he leaves, ears pink and heart pounding.

\---

By Friday his mood is pretty low, feeling tired and burned out.

There is a rehearsal dinner scheduled for that night for both families which makes him feel queasy every time he thinks about it. He’s an introvert by nature and the inherent social requirements of the week are beginning to wear at him and fray his already limited tolerance - and that’s without factoring in that he’s been surrounded by his ex-boyfriends scathing, opinionated family all week who seem to be under the impression that he is some kind of heartless manwhore.

“No one thinks you’re a heartless manwhore,” his mother assures him from where they are standing behind the counter at _Hales Holistic,_ pencilling in appointments and doing last minute stocktake.

“Those are literally the words that Lydia’s cousin used to describe me - to my face,” Derek replies, telling his mother the story of Derek’s short-lived attendance at Cora and Lydia’s joint bachelorette party the night before. Like everything this week, Derek had been adamantly against going at all, initially protesting the expectation of his attendance with all of his might, although he ad acquiesced at Laura and Cora’s insistence that he turn up, however briefly. Brief being the word he clutched onto. He’d regretted showing up at all, the moment that he did - set at Beacon Hills only LGBTQ friendly club - the party was boozy and glittery and _loud_ , and there were more vagina and breast themed food, drinks and toys than he’d ever needed to see again, ever. Especially while his sisters were in the same room. Folds and nipples for days.

“Maybe they were just jealous,” his mother offers.

Derek snorts. “Of what?”

“Of your beautiful face and your beautiful brain,” she grins, cupping his face with her hands and squeezing his cheeks between her fingers.

“Ma,” he complains, squirming out of her hold, holding up a pencil between them like a sword until she holds her hands up in surrender.

The door chimes when a customer exits the store. “I just don’t get it,” she says moments later, looking down at the books and shaking her curly head.

Neither does Derek.

Throughout the day they get their share of visitors and clients. Mrs MacPherson, Derek’s old art teacher, drops by for an acupuncture appointment, stopping to comment on how grown up Derek looks now. Even one of Lydia’s numerous aunts drops by to pick up her tincture.   
  
Laura, too, stops by to ‘help out’ for a few hours, doing mostly nothing except marvelling loudly at the sense of nostalgia and deja vu being behind the counter gives her. With her feet propped up on the counter and customers in plain view, she takes advantage of all of the beauty samples, rubbing moisturiser over her skin and spritzing herself with perfume. In one of the lulls she quietly confides to Derek that while she misses the town and their family, she can’t see herself giving up New York, not right now at this point in her life and that’s why, Derek thinks, he’s always been closer to Laura out of anybody else. She gets it. Derek’s parents used to say that he and her were two sides of the same coin, noticeably different but the same at the heart of it.

She’d taken the words right out of Derek’s own head, the sense of eerie detachment from the town they grew up in. He feels settled and more himself in Sacramento than he has ever felt before in any time of his life in Beacon Hills. He feels none of the hometown compression when he’s there, no one has any preconceived ideas about him there. Maybe some of it is the novelty of being an independent adult, but he’d like to think it’s the air, of being right where he’s meant to be at that point in his life. Even if he can’t have the dream job he envisioned not so long ago, at least he’s kept his promise to himself to stay out of Beacon Hills where he never really felt he fit in anyway, not without trying to be someone else. It would always be a place he calls his home, but not where he feels he belongs right now.

Cora calls in too in the mid-afternoon too, looking tired and pale, munching idly on a half eaten apple. The siblings huddle behind the counter together like they used to when they were kids to keep out of trouble and it’s a pensive, quiet moment, helping to bring a sense of calm over Derek as they watch outside the store windows, passersby on the street going about their day.

“I can’t believe I’m getting married tomorrow,” Cora mumbles from where she’s sitting against the wall, gently moving Laura’s swivel chair with her feet.

“I know. I can’t believe someone actually wants to marry you,” Laura agrees solemnly.

“You’re a dick,” Cora quips, kicking her sisters shin.

“No, really,” Laura adds, wincing as she rubs her leg where Cora’s kick landed. “Does Lydia know the story of when you wet your pants when you were five and you cried about it --”

Cora scowls, kicking at the chair again to send it moving across the floor on it’s wheels. “I swear to god, Laura, if you tell that story during your speech tomorrow I will kick your ass.”

Derek and Laura share a conspiring grin. He can see the cogs working behind his older sisters head and knows exactly what she’s thinking.

Tomorrow is fine, but Cora didn’t say anything about speeches tonight.

  
\---

It’s nearing five o’clock when Derek is left alone to close up the shop, his mother and sisters having already headed home to get ready for the rehearsal dinner. Derek had volunteered to close the place down for the weekend, eager to drag it out as long as possible, perhaps even ‘accidentally’ missing the whole dinner entirely - wouldn’t that be a shame. He takes his time to locks up the registers, dusts the counters and shelves and locks up the practice rooms. He even does some emergency inventory, suddenly finding it incredibly interesting and necessary.

It isn’t until he fishes his phone from his pocket to check his messages that he notices it’s sitting only at five percent battery and places it on charge at the wall near the counter. This will mean that Derek might have to stay at the shop longer until there is sufficient charge. What an utter travesty, he thinks and rolls his eyes to himself, bringing up a game of Solitaire on the store computer.  
  
Derek’s thinking about playing some mood music from the small stereo when there is a knock on the front glass door. Derek frowns - it’s past five now, the shop clearly displaying the “CLOSED” sign on the door. When he looks up, he sees Stiles peering through the glass, squinting into the dimly lit room, Stiles’ face hardening when he finally spots Derek on the other side.

Huh.

Honestly, Derek’s most forthcoming and overwhelming urge is to leave him outside, more than happy to leave the guy standing there tapping the glass impatiently. He’s entirely without a single clue as to what Stiles would be doing here - alone - after the shop has closed. For just a second, before he can stop it, there is a sick little bubble of hope in Dereks stomach thinking that maybe Stiles is there to see _him_ , but with the put-off look on Stiles face he perishes the thought quickly. Stiles wouldn’t of even known that Derek would be here today, Derek didn’t even know he’d be here - and it’s not like he wants see Stiles either, in fact, the sooner he leaves the better.

Derek approaches the door warily, unlocking it and letting Stiles inside, long, gangly limbs donned in a black hoodie and blue jeans.

“Can I help you?” Derek deadpans, closing the door behind them. Stiles is at first quiet,  scanning around the place looking for something.

“Is your mom here?”

“...No,” Derek says slowly, confused, “we’re closed. They’re all headed to the rehearsal dinner. What are _you_ doing here?”

Stiles winces, fidgeting with his phone as he opens up his messages. “Lydia said she left your sisters ring with your mom in the safe-room.”

Derek stares. Stiles, noticeably flustered, rambles: “The uh - y’know, the room with the safe, for you know --”

“Safekeeping?”

“Safekeeping, yeah. She wanted me to come and grab the ring tonight before the ceremony and then I got stuck in traffic after work and blah blah blah - anyway, I know you wish a plague upon my house or whatever but if you could, like, help Lydia out I’m sure she’d appreciate it.”

Derek crosses his arms over his chest and rolls his eyes heavenwards, desperately wanting nothing more than to flat out refuse any request that comes from Stiles no matter the source or size. He’s almost childish enough to do it for a one-up, but in the end he knows it will only cause more drama and frustration for his sister, so he nods grudgingly.

“Fine,” he grouses, “wait here. Don’t touch anything.”

His patience and benevolence is not rewarded when he sees Stiles deliberately stroke a finger down a jar of anise, whistling to himself. _Ignore it,_ Derek tells himself as his fists clench, _ignore the man-child_.

Derek heads out the back into what essentially was intended to be a break room once upon a time, fully equipped with a ratty second-hand sofa, a microwave that no longer works, a few board games stacked on a crooked bookshelf and a small safe in the corner.

Like almost everything else in the unused room, the door leading into it malfunctions and can only be opened from the outside. It’s a hazard no one has gotten around to fixing, so to avoid the possibility of getting locked in, Derek grabs a bucket from the hallway to place between the frame and door. Screaming internally, Derek enters the code into the safe, twisting the knob to the correct numbers and wrenching it open when it clicks. The sooner he gets this damn thing outta here the sooner Stiles and the stench of his terrible cologne can go. Derek roves his eyes over the contents of the safe, crouching down. From what he can see there is mostly petty cash, a couple of knick-knacks, an antique watch and two black velvet boxes right in the back. One of the boxes is a little older, a little more worn than the other, it’s fabric duller.

Derek knows this one by heart.

His fingertips know the texture of every fibre of the material like a second skin. His nails have met the ridges of the opening more than a priests hands have met in prayer. His stupid, stupid heart still twists in that old, familiar way, and he knows he shouldn't, but Derek can’t help but stare entranced a little longer, drawn to the echo of the dreams and yearning he had poured into the small box and the metal inside it.

Derek must have been staring longer than he realizes because he soon hears Stiles approaching, feet thudding down to hall and calling out for him. Stiles pauses in the doorway, looking over to where Derek is frozen still before the safe.

“What’s taking so long - did you find it?” Stiles asks, stumbling slightly when he shuffles forward, “Oh okay, wow, umm that’s a hazard - what’s this doing here?” He asks, leg pushing the bucket away from the door to avoid tripping over it with his long legs as he steps inside.

“Wait - don’t,” Derek shouts too late, eyes clamping shut as the door shuts behind them with a tell-tale creak of its hinges. Heart racing and plummeting at the same time, Derek sinks to the ground and puts his head in his hands.

“What? What’s the problem?”

Derek steadies himself with a deep breath before answering. “Fuck.”

“ _What_?”

“The door only opens from the outside,” he mumbles into his hands, scrubbing them up and down his face as if it will make the situation go away. “The bucket was there for a reason, you idiot.”

Incensed, Stiles grumbles, “I’m an idiot? It’s _fine_  you raging drama queen- just text someone to get us out of here. It’s not a big freaking deal, geez.”

“You’re the dumbass that got us locked in here - _you_ text someone.”

“I will,” Stiles retorts, patting down his pockets for his phone repeatedly, the expression on his face becoming profoundly more lost the longer he goes without producing his phone. “Well, I _would_ ...if I hadn’t left it on the shelf out there.”  
  
“Amazing,” Derek says.

“Fine. Where’s yours?”

“Charging by the counter.”

“Oh,” Stiles says, nodding before realization begins it's dawn on his face. “Oh. Ohh no. No. Nope. This isn’t happening. _No_. I am not getting stuck in this shoebox with you.”

“You think I want to be stuck in here with _you_?” Derek asks incredulously, eyebrows raised, shaking his head. “I can’t believe this. You couldn’t trust me for two minutes to find something and now we’re stuck in this room for god knows how long.”

“Two minutes? I don’t trust you for two seconds!”

Derek laughs low and ugly. “What was I going to do - steal my own sisters wedding ring the night before she gets married?”

“Nothing you would do could surprise me,” Stiles murmurs, looking at him with such loathing and disdain that Derek can’t help but laugh again, hopelessness overtaking his higher brain function. He can’t even wrap his head around the utter ridiculousness of the situation - that out of all the scenarios that had played out in his head when it came to being alone with Stiles again, this one never came up. They could be in here for _hours_ before somebody realizes that they’re not where they should be. They’re going to kill each other, Derek thinks, he can practically see it now. It’s going to be like that movie with Kathleen Turner and Michael Douglas except much bloodier and without Danny DeVito.

“I hate you,” Derek says with feeling.

“Feeling’s mutual, asshole, I hate you too. What was taking so long anyway? Is it even in here?”

Derek waves his hand carelessly towards the safe, giving Stiles permission to peruse through the contents, not worrying that Stiles would bother stealing any of the goods or cash while Derek was in the room. It’s not like he could get far with it.

“Why are there two ring boxes?” Stiles asks suddenly, looking through the safe. “Which one is the one Lydia bought?”

Panic washes over Derek like a bucket of cold water, tiny shocks radiating down his spine. He reaches out with numb fingertips to try and take the shabby one from Stiles hands but Stiles is too quick for him, moving both boxes out of his reach and squirming away to sit on the sofa.

“Stiles, wait --”

“Oh, it’s Stiles to you now, is it?” The man asks, nodding to himself as he wrenches the worn, older box open. “It’s not Hitler or Judas or....” he trails off, pulling a distinctly masculine ring from the groove in the box and holding it up to the light.

“That’s, um... not the ring Lydia bought,” Stiles says quietly, fumbling to put it back in the box and closing it with a loud snap. Derek can’t help but watch with a horrifying sense of impending doom as Stiles quickly checks the other box that holds the correct ring, closing it and shoving it in the pocket of his hoodie.

Holy fucking god. Derek presses himself further into the wall and avoids eye contact, head reeling from how quickly the entire evening has gone from uncomfortable to downright catastrophic levels of horrible. The tension in the room builds to a crescendo and he can’t see a way that either of them are going to get out of this unscathed, especially Derek, feeling like every raw nerve he’d been trying to cover up for the last eleven months is now ripped open and exposed. He can feel the weight of Stiles eyes on him, can almost hear his quick brain turning over all of what he just saw, the confusion palpable in the air.

“Derek.”

“Don’t,” Derek croaks, closing his eyes.

“The inscription on that ring....That’s from our --”

“ _Don’t_.”

“For the love of - don’t ‘don’t’ me, Derek! You owe me a freakin’ goddamn explanation,” Stiles explodes, jumping up from the sofa brandishing the box at Derek, cheeks going pink as fury sparks in his eyes. “What the fuck is this?”

“I don’t owe you shit. There’s nothing to explain,” Derek says, his voice thin and low to try and keep out the wobbliness.

“Bullshit! When did you get it? How long have you had it?”

Derek shrugs minutely, shoving his shaking hands under his knees. “A few years. I don’t know. It doesn’t matter now, does it?”

Stiles stops dead centre in the room and looks at him with a thunderous expression. “So, what? Apparently you wanted to _marry_ me?”

Derek’s chest stings with the notes of incredulity coloring Stiles voice, still hurt that that they weren’t on the same page after all. “I --”

“ -- and then you dumped me out of nowhere - and you say it doesn’t matter? What the hell’s wrong with you?”

A lump forms in Dereks’ throat as all of the old pain he’d thought he’d buried deep into fossilisation comes back up molten hot in his chest. He’d never been good at the suppression part. “What do you mean what’s wrong with me? Of course I didn’t ask you to marry me. Why the hell would I?"

Stiles throws his hands out in a big _i-don't-fucking-know_ shrug, lips twisting derisively. "I don't know why you did or didn't, that's what I'm asking - like, hello. I'm not the one who bought the ring."

"I’m not the one who fell out of love and dragged my family into the relationship.”

“I’m sorry, what.” Stiles lowers the zip of his hoodie until he can slip it off, fanning himself in the face with his hands. “No really,” Stiles continues. “ _What_? When did I fall out of love? When did I ever say that?”

“You didn’t have to say it,” Derek snipes, heat creeping up his neck. “I could tell.”

“Okay, you’re actually delusional --”

“You stopped saying you loved me the moment we were getting serious about planning our life together - you started talking about moving back to Beacon Hills - it was like you couldn't get away from me sooner!” Derek exclaims.

“ _What_?”

“Suddenly you wanted to move back? You told me you wanted to ‘move on and go’. Your family was in your ear and I didn’t have a place in your life anymore. I figured that was as good a sign as any.”

“Okay, wow. That’s a real fucking reach, Derek,” Stiles shakes his head. “Jesus christ. If that was really the case then why wouldn’t you try and talk to me about it. You want to know what I think?”

“I don’t care.”

Stiles barrels on, pacing around the room. “I think you got a fancy new job in Sacramento and I think you didn’t want to compromise, so you packed up your shit and gave me an ultimatum.”

Derek chokes. “Are you joking? Are you missing the part where your family said to my face that I was just temporary and you didn’t even correct them?”

“They never said that --”

“I _distinctly_ remember asking your aunt for her pierogi recipe one night at dinner when she turned around and point-blank said: _I could but what’s the point, it’s not like you’ll be around long enough to learn it anyway._ ”

Stiles gesticulates wildly, “They always said stupid shit like that! They’re ancient, overbearing assholes! You knew that and it never bothered you before.”

He shakes his head, not wanting to have this conversation ever. “You always had my back before.”

“I _always_ had your back,” Stiles says, furious. “Fuck you, Derek, I always supported you, I was there for every single one of your bad days. It was you who ran off the second I wanted to do something different.”

“Your family wanted you to do something different - and you were the idiot that went along with it!”

“My family tried to warn me that you would drop me the second you had a better opportunity - and you did!”

Derek shakes his head, drawing his knees up to his chest. “This isn’t...are we even having the same conversation anymore?”

“I don’t know,” Stiles admits, deflating quickly. He swallows audibly and blinks rapidly up at the ceiling. A moment of silence stretches between them before Derek plucks up enough of the tremulous slivers of his remaining courage.

“Why do you think I broke it off?”

Stiles licks his lips, looking down at his jiggling feet. “You got that job offer in Sacramento like you always wanted. Then one day you just flat-out said you couldn’t do this anymore and that you were leaving.”

That’s not how Derek remembers it at all. In his whole life Derek isn’t sure he could ever say up until this moment that he’d been stunned into silence but he feels it now, like a foot pressing down on his sternum, compressing all the words out of him. “That’s not…”

“ --Then I said fine, fuck you very much, packed my shit and left.”

“Stiles --”

Stiles laughs wetly, avoiding eye contact. “Thank you so, _so_ much for making me explain that to you, of all people, it’s not like I was heartbroken or devastated or anything. But I’m over it now, so it’s fine. Grass is greener or some shit.”

The room in the air gets colder. “I broke up with you because you were dragging me along after you lost interest and clearly wanted to part ways,” Derek whispers. “I thought, what’s the point of trying to convince you to come with me when you seemed to want to grow apart? All we ever did was fight in the end and you know it.”

Stiles moves closer, gesturing between them. “You were... - I was,” he stutters. “I was always waiting for the other shoe to drop - and when it did...”

“Jesus,” Derek says, scrubbing his face again. “I didn’t care about the place we lived as long as you wanted to be there with me. We were going to take everyone on together, remember? I thought you didn’t want that anymore.” Derek swallows around the sharpest pain he still harbours. “...You seemed happy to be done with playing house with me.”

“Did I really not tell you I loved you?” Stiles strays off topic, a tear falling down his cheek. “Because I did. I would have fucking done anything for you back then.”

“Then why didn’t you?” Derek asks, voice thick with emotion. “You changed your study to law, even though you hate it. Practically overnight you lost interest in all of your ambitions and everything that we planned together. All of that’s fine. I would have stood by you if I thought you would have stood up for me.”

“I didn’t realize I wasn’t.”

“I didn’t know..." Derek says, trailing off, unsure how to finish that sentence. Under the yellow light Stiles looks like he's barely holding it together, hair limp and skin sallow. Derek doesn't know how he didn't see it before - he looks as terrible as Derek feels. Could all of this anger and fighting really have been over tiny, collective misunderstandings and misinterpretations? The thought is almost too much to swallow, all of the time wasted and opportunities squandered out of their own inability to get their heads out of their asses.

“How did this happen?” Stiles asks, wiping his eyes angrily. “We were good together, weren’t we? What happened?”

Derek shrugs, lungs filling with an unbearable sadness. Quiet sweeps over them, roving over the new crevices and canyons between them. It still hurts, but it doesn’t burn like the furious squalls did. “Lack of communication, probably.”

“Communication,” Stiles repeats, wiping his nose with his sleeve. “We used to talk all the damn time. Why did we stop?”

“I don’t know.”

“Fine then - how is the new job?”

A little thrown by the non-sequitur Derek tries to keep up. “I fucking _hate_ it,” he says honestly, smiling helplessly against the ache when Stiles throws his head back and laughs. The man wipes his cheeks again and walks over to sit next to Derek, sliding his back down the wall. Derek shivers when their shoulder press together, the heat and sensation all familiar and foreign at the same time. It’s the closest they’ve been to each other in nearly a year.

“Me too,” Stiles laments bitterly, gesturing to the room at large. “I literally can’t stand it. I go to work everyday and wonder what the fuck I think I’m doing. I’m still in my parents house, processing divorce papers and deceased estates for a living - it’s fucking depressing, man.”

“I’m a physiotherapist for a washed-up, homophobic tennis hack who has a fungal infection and refuses to shower before he sees me.”

Derek and Stiles sigh in unison.

“Ah fuck,” Stiles sighs, wiping his eyes. “This is really not how I planned my life to work out.”

“Same.”

Stiles knocks their knees together, huffing loudly. “We were going to... we were supposed to….” he swallows again, looking away and sniffling.

“C’mere,” Derek says, blinking back his own tears and hooking his arm around Stiles neck. His throat hurts with the lump it's holding and he swallows ineffectively around it. Instead, Derek releases the words that have been in tangles on his tongue for the better part of a year. “I’m sorry. I should have just talked to you.”

Stiles breath hitches and he quickly covers his eyes with his hand, his shoulders shaking beneath Derek’s outstretched arm. Derek waits patiently for the sniffling to subside, thumb stroking back and forth on Stiles arm. “I’m such a fucking idiot, I’ve been so mad at you this whole time,” he says some time later. “All of this time we could have been building a life together. It should have been _us_ tomorrow.”

The admission makes Derek’s throat close up and his jaw heavy, throbbing with could-of-been heartache. “Can’t change it now,” he says. Stiles shakes his head at his lamentation.

“Why not?”

Derek isn’t sure he’s hearing this right. “There are a thousand and one reasons ‘why not’. We’re not together for one. We’ve been fighting for nearly an entire year, we live in different cities --"

"Yeah, details," Stiles says dismissively. 

"Yeah, details," Derek mocks. "I just told you I hated you.”

"Do you?” Stiles presses. “Hate me, I mean ‘cause, like, I definitely lied. I don’t hate you. I really, really wanted to though, a whole freaking lot. Hating you would have made my life so much easier.”

“No,” Derek admits, shuffling their sides closer and staring out into the room. “I kind of wanted to punch your stupid face and key your car though.”

“Same!” Stiles breathes. “God, same.”

“Stiles?”

“Yeah?”

“...Would you have said yes, before?”

“Had we not managed to completely miscommunicate? Yeah, in a fucking heartbeat.”

Derek nods, lifting his arm off Stiles’ shoulders and looking down at his hands. He genuinely doesn’t know if the knowledge makes him feel better or worse.

“Derek?”

“What?”

“Why did you keep the ring?”

“I missed you,” Derek answers truthfully. “Even though I made the decision to break it off, I didn’t want us to be over.”

“Do you still love me?”

Derek shrugs, flipping the box over in his hands when Stiles passes it over to him. The box feels warmer, heavier than all of the times that he’s held it before. He doesn’t know if the act of Stiles giving it back to him is supposed to mean anything.

“Does it matter?”

“Yes. I still --” Stiles breaks off, clenching his jaw.

“What about your girlfriend?” Derek says, scowling at the last word.

“Who?”

“The woman at the bar. The dinner on Sunday?”

“Allison?” Stiles squawks indignantly. “We’re not - dude, we just went to high school together, okay? I just wanted company at that stupid dinner because I knew you were going to be there and I didn’t want to be seen as a sad, single loser after I’d been dumped.”

Derek turns his head to assess Stiles face. With his cheeks tear-streaked and puffy and his eyes red-rimmed, Stiles is still beautiful enough to steal the words right out of Derek’s mouth. “Oh,” he says, instead.

Stiles eyes soften and he reaches up a hand to cup Derek’s jaw, sliding his thumb back and forth over Derek’s cheekbone, just the way he used to. “I missed you too,” Stiles whispers, leaning in to press a kiss to the corner of Derek’s mouth, receding only millimetres away from Derek’s lips as he moves back, breath warm over Derek’s lips, the cold tip of Stiles nose grazing Derek’s cheek.

Derek shakes when he brushes their noses together, a fissure quaking apart relentlessly in his chest full of unshed tears and unresolved hurt, trembling all over when he tilts his head and captures Stiles lips in a soft, chaste kiss. Stiles lips are salty where they are pressed against his, slightly chapped but as full as Derek remembers. Even though so much has changed between them, it still feels as comforting as it used to, the shape of his mouth, the slide of Stiles’ nose against his. Too heartsick to  do much else, he steals another short kiss, parting to press their foreheads together.

“We should really talk about this,” Derek says.

“Yeah,” Stiles concurs, kissing him again.

It’s remarkably easy to get lost in the slide of lips and the caress of gentle fingers against his face. Alone in this room with only the two of them, he finds himself rediscovering how the skin of Stiles throat tastes when he presses a kiss just under his jaw, and how the stubble of Derek’s beard makes Stiles fingers curl when brushed against his neck.

When Derek tilts his head back up to kiss Stiles again, the breath on his face and the bottom lip caught between Derek’s own make the enduring pangs in his chest easier to ignore. Maybe if they never stop kissing they can forget why they were there in the first place.

It’s a dangerous thought, wanting to pretend like there’s nothing between them. With it in mind Derek pulls back a little to get some space between them but it’s still too close. Derek could probably put an entire country between them and still find a way to get lost in the moment with Stiles. But as captivated as he was, Derek was also terribly uncertain, he didn’t want to lose himself in the heat of the moment if this was all there was.

“What are we doing?” Derek hesitates.

Stiles pauses in thought before answering, taking his hand back from Derek’s face and placing it on his knee instead. “I don’t know? We could start over - or start again? I mean, if that’s what you want,” he hurries to say, face falling when Derek doesn’t immediately react.

Placing his hand over Stiles and linking their fingers together Derek tries to reason with his hammering heart that’s beating out more deadly hope that what he can contain. For eleven months, two weeks and two days all Derek has ever wanted was for things to go back to the way that they were before, to wipe the slate clean and to go back in time. But _even_ if they could go back to what they had, where does all of the lingering anger and resentment go?

Derek just wants his best friend back.

“Maybe we could take it slow?” Derek says finally. “I think we should talk it out before we…uh...”

“Jump straight into sex?” Stiles prompts.

“Yeah.”

“Okay,” Stiles agrees, quietly, squeezing his hand. “I think -”

“ _Stiles? Derek?_ ” The concerned voice of his mother shouts from the hallway. “ _Are you still here_?”

“Looks like they found us,” Derek mutters, standing up and letting go of Stiles hand.

“We’re in here!” Stiles yells back. “We got locked in!”

Derek looks to Stiles, afraid that leaving this room will act as some kind of pin to their bubble, afraid that maybe outside is the real world and that this room was the waiting room for all of their parallel universes. Stiles seems to catch on to his apprehension though, catching his eyes and smiling wryly.

“We’re gonna take this real slow,” Stiles assures him. “Like, glacially slow. A snail stuck in molasses kind of slow, even.”

“Yeah,” Derek says, nodding. “Slow.”

\------------

**One day later**

“Ohh fuck,” Stiles moans, bracing his hands on Derek’s chest as he lowers himself upon Derek’s cock, head thrown back in pleasure as he sinks to the hilt, ass flush with Derek’s groin. Stiles raises himself up a little, the movement making the copious amounts of lube applied between them squelch sluggishly, the noise combined with the grunts sounding filthy. “Fuck yes.”

Derek slides his hands up Stiles thighs until they rest just below his groin, snapping his own hips upwards, driving his cock deeper into the tight, wet heat of Stiles hole. A bead of sweat runs down his temple as he pants, enjoying the way the muscles of Stiles’ bare thighs tense and relax under his hands when he raises on his knees, plowing himself on Derek’s cock.

The mattress underneath them squeaks and the bed sheets beneath them rustle noisily with every bounce, but Derek can’t really find it within him to care. He cards his fingers through the thick, wiry thatch of pubic hair above Stiles erect, leaking cock, and is rewarded for his actions when Stiles movements stutters, his mouth dropping open with a cut off groan. Tugging gently at a few hairs, Derek remembers this particular sensitive spot very well and grins.

“Like that?”

“Mhmm, fuck, just like that...”

“Yeah?"

“Mmm yeah, feels so fucking good,” Stiles sighs, grinding his hips down, taking his cock in his hand and jacking it lightly. Derek’s eyes are drawn to the flush on Stiles chest, the redness of the mans hard nipples, the erotic line of chest hair between his pectorals and the moles that mark his skin.

“I can’t believe we thought we could do slow,” Derek says on a groan as Stiles wriggles around on the spot a little, spreading his legs further apart as if it would help him get the cock in his ass deeper inside him

“That was pretty - _unghh_ \-  dumb of us,” Stiles agrees, voice hitching as he resumes bouncing up and down. “Though in my defence - _oh fuck_ , fuck, right there.”

Getting increasingly fed up with the space between their bodies prompts Derek to sit up, gripping Stiles ass cheeks with his hands to brace him so he doesn’t fall back with the change in angle. He sucks the salty skin at Stiles throat, biting gently. “In your defence what?”

“In my defence,” Stiles continues, running his fingers through Derek’s hair and tugging while Derek mouths at his neck, “it’s not my fault you looked so damn sexy in that tux.”

After Dereks’ mother had freed them from their momentary imprisonment in the back room they’d suffered through the amusement of everyone at the rehearsal dinner that night, smiling good-naturedly at the overt awe that neither of the exes had come out with a single bruise or a black eye. By some unspoken agreement the two decided to keep their burgeoning reconciliation to themselves, both scared of shattering what fragile hold they had on it in the few hours since. Derek thinks his mother might have known though with the way she kept smiling at him.

The ceremony the following day was beautiful, if not nerve-wracking. Standing in a hotel ballroom in front of two hundred guests was stressful enough, watching his baby sister nearly trip down the aisle was another story. When Lydia and Cora, both looking stunning, had read their vows to each other there were audible sniffles throughout their room - Derek’s dad loudly blowing his nose into his jacket handkerchief and openly weeping. Derek couldn’t find it within himself to be embarrassed by it when his own tears had to be blinked back more than once, so he let it slide.

It was once the reception had well and truly gotten underway when everything quickly crumpled. Speeches were made, cake was cut and the music began. Stiles and Derek had managed to keep to themselves since they’d parted the night before, exchanging polite nods in public whilst unable to steal a private moment during the jammed wedding schedule. Derek has reasoned that it shouldn’t be a problem, they were going to take it slow and keep it to themselves for a while anyway.

The keeping it slow part - and maybe the keeping it on the lowdown part - strained when Derek overheard Stiles’ uncle-slash-boss refer to Derek as Stiles “backwater hippy ex-boyfriend” and “ _thank god Stiles had moved on_ ” amongst conversation with other family. Derek, the next table over, wasn’t even offended - he’d heard far worse before and that was including from his own family.  
  
He’d rolled his eyes so hard they almost fell into his champagne when he’d heard Stiles splutter indignantly, chair screeching back as he’d stood up.  It caught Derek completely off guard when a hot flash speared down his body and curled tightly in his gut when Stiles pointed at his uncle and told him he was a “geriatric asshole” that needed to “shut up and mind his own goddamn business”.

Derek had to roll the sleeves of his dress shirt up, suddenly too warm when Stiles had proceeded to stare down the other family members at the table and tell them that the same warning went for them. To his mortification, Derek could feel his dick stirring with interest when Stiles flourished the tirade by downing the remainder of his champagne and slamming the glass on the table. The way that Stiles had missed his mouth when drinking, liquid pooling down his neck and into his dress shirt was _hot_.

Stiles had then turned around and caught Derek’s gaze, looking at him with a strange expression before turning around to leave. Glancing around to ensure no one had seen their exchange Derek had quickly drank down the rest of his glass, following the sleek line of Stiles back as he left the reception hall with increasing confusion.

It wasn’t until his phone vibrated with a message in his pocket two minutes later that he understood.

**> room 464**

Grinning, Derek pocketed his phone again and left the hall with a skip in his step, taking the nearest elevator to the fourth floor, heart racing. Once he’d located the room and knocked on the door which would swing open a moment later, revealing Stiles who appeared to have already lost his vest to the floor, beckoning him inside.

Without warning Derek had been shoved against the hard door, a palm on his chest to pin him there.

“I hate this suit,” Stiles says, sliding his hand up and tugging at the bowtie of Derek’s dress shirt until it falls to the floor. “It’s obscene, just look at your goddamn pants. What is your ass even _made_ out of?”

Stiles would get intimately re-acquainted with it a few minutes later after he’d dropped Derek’s pants to his ankles, turning him around and sticking his face between Derek’s ass cheeks, fervently nosing and licking at his hole. Derek, incredibly turned on and utterly weak to the sensation of a wet, firm tongue and hot breath against his hole, had just leaned his face against the door and moaned. Stiles had placed both hands on Derek’s cheeks, spreading them apart so he could lick the entire way up and down Derek’s crack, stroking his hole with sure fingers. The slick, eager sounds that Stiles made when he reunited his tongue with the pucker not long after made Derek harder than he’d ever been in his life.

Any thoughts of going slow flew out the window, but Derek couldn’t remember in that moment why he should care or why they wanted that to begin with.

Look - when it had been nearly a year since someone else had played with your ass and there was someone eager to give you a thorough rimjob, it was only polite to whimper and spread your legs a little. Everything about Stiles was insistent - his fingers, his tongue, the strokes against Derek’s taint - it was only courteous to let Stiles go at his ass like he was starving for it. It wasn’t Derek’s fault that Stiles liked eating ass so much.

And if that led to Derek pushing Stiles roughly onto the bed, ridding him of their clothes and spreading Stiles legs apart in order to give him a sloppy blowjob, then so be it. Stiles knew how much Derek liked a firm, warm cock in his mouth, he was just returning the favor.

And really, if they were going to go to all that trouble, Derek might as well let Stiles flip them over, watch him quickly finger himself and mount himself on Dereks’ cock like he was straddling a horse.

“I missed this,” Stiles groans in the present, arms wrapped loosely around Derek’s neck as Derek pounds up into him, the sound of skin slapping reverberating around them. Derek doesn’t answer, just angles his head upwards to catch Stiles lips in a wet kiss, licking into his mouth. But he’d missed it too: the way that their bodies fit when pressed together, the slick and slide of their sweat and skin, how Stiles’ quiet, breathy _ah-ah-ah’s_ sounded right next to Derek’s ear. He’d missed the weight of Stiles over him, the comforting pressure of the man’s arms around his, the way that Stiles’ body curled around his could make it seem like they were the only two people in the world.

Derek comes with his teeth biting into Stiles shoulder to stifle his cry. The orgasm ripples through him, overriding his hands as they grip roughly on Stiles ass and his hips as they continue to snap upwards in quick thrusts. His vision blurs momentarily, but when it clears he wraps a hand around Stiles warm cock, using the pre-come leaking from the slit to slick the twists and pulls as he jacks him off.

With fingers scrabbling at Derek’s back, Stiles comes moments after, mouth open and panting against Derek’s cheek, spilling his warm release into Derek’s hand. It takes Stiles a minute or so to come back to himself, dismounting when he does and falling back on the mattress with a long, loud sigh.

Derek follows, collapsing onto his back next to Stiles and staring up at the ceiling, muscles burning pleasantly as tiredness kneads itself over his body.

“So I think we can cross make-up sex off our list,” Stiles says, breaking the silence.

Derek groans. “You and that goddamn list.”

“Hey,” Stiles protests, shifting over to rest his head on Derek’s shoulder, “me and that _amazing_ list provided you with some pretty awesome orgasms. Remember that time in LA with the thing?”

“Oh yeah,” Derek says fondly, moving his arm from under Stiles to wrap around his shoulders, allowing Stiles to snuggle in further. It’s weird to talk about their past when it was essentially a closed book only twenty-four hours ago, perpetually finished, but once again time has caught him off guard with it’s scatterbrained design. It leaves him feeling like he’s experiencing some kind of dream-like, stranger-than-fiction moment where time speeds up but also doesn’t move, where both nothing and everything has changed.

Later they will talk about how Derek needs to leave for Sacramento soon for work and how they can potentially start to merge their new lives together. Stiles will tell Derek that he can quit his job at the family firm and find another and Derek will wish he could do the same with similar ease. They’ll talk about how to talk to one another, without talking around one another. Later, in the quiet and the dark, Derek will tell Stiles about how very black the hole he fell into after their break-up was and how his family helped him climb out of it. Stiles will kiss him again and tell him he knows exactly where that place is. For all of their scheming the future looks more like hope than any of their plans ever before. 

Later, Stiles runs his fingers reverently over Derek’s lips, his eyebrows, the slope of his nose. Derek says, “You know, we’re going to have to face everyone eventually. There’s no way they won’t know now.”

Stiles strokes Derek’s cheek and smiles assuredly. “It’s okay. We’ll survive that too.”


	2. Chapter 2

**One Year Later**

 

Derek never in his life thought he would be a book-by-the-beach person. Meaning to say, he never really considered himself to be the type of guy to take a book to the beach and actually sit and read it - after all, if you made all the effort of putting on swim trunks, finding a car park and getting ankle-deep in the gritty sand, why not take advantage of the water when you can read a book at home, or literally anywhere else? Yet here he finds himself, at the beach sprawled over a large, threadbare towel and reading a heavy novel held just above his face to block out the suns harsh glare. He absolutely plans to get into the water and go for a swim at some stage, but for now he's happy to listen to the waves whilst flipping the pages of his historical fiction, warmed by the sun and sand. There's just something about taking the time out of your hectic adult life to indulge in some good-old recreational reading, not for work, not for school, just for himself. It's like, fulfilling or cathartic or whatever.

It's a pretty interesting book - a recommendation from Lydia no less. Turns out they shared a common passion for history and a common disdain for inaccuracies in fiction. Once Cora and Lydia had returned from their honeymoon Derek, all new developments aside, had begun to get to know his sister-in-law better. While they'd never be best friends, there was a burgeoning sense of respect and affection. After all, he can't divorce himself from the Stilinski-Martin family now, might as well pick his battles wisely. So here he is, lying on the sand like a beached whale and reading through an exciting plot point - Derek's feeling some second-hand satisfaction when a lesser villain receives banishment from the royal kingdom, smirking at their fall from grace, when he is startled from his readings by cold droplets of water falling all over him.

Lowering his book to spot the offender, Derek's smirk grows at the sight of his boyfriend. "Oh. I must say Stiles, that shade of red is just  _fetching_ on you."  
  
Stiles scowls at Derek, the flush of anger utterly imperceptible against the deep pink sunburn on his face, hair dripping wet. Wearing only a tank top for protection, the burn extends down from his face to the top of Stiles shoulders and along his collarbone where they are exposed, the skin looking very painfully heated. The worst is definitely along Stiles nose though, red and taut and accompanied by a feeble pout upon his lips. Derek barely withholds the sigh that threatens to pass his lips - he _told_ Stiles not to go into the water so quickly after applying sunscreen.

"Why did we come here again?" Stiles asks, dropping down onto the towel to sit cross-legged with a wince. He leans forward to rest his forearms and head on Derek's bare stomach, Derek barely holding back a flinch when the cold mop of wet hair comes into contact with his bare skin. 

"Because we like the beach," Derek reminds him, putting his book down still spread to card his fingers through Stiles hair, scratching his scalp lightly.

"Do we? Do we really? Or do we only like it until we remember that sand chafes in uncomfortable areas and the sun is a bitch?"

"Yes, we do. Also, our air conditioning is broken."

Stiles scoffs against Derek's stomach, like the very idea offends him. Maybe he just conveniently doesn't remember the way he starfished on their kitchen tiles, complaining loudly to Derek about the heat and how nice it would be to be by the water. Derek opens his mouth to remind him but swallows the words when Stiles twists his head sideways to look to Derek, face soft and eyes bright. Derek kind of wants to put him in a headlock for dragging them out here and getting him wet but he also kind of wants to feed Stiles the sandwiches from their cooler and water him and make sure he's okay. It's a very conflicting moment, urges warring against each other, until Derek acquiesces to his softer side. Derek's not a total pushover though, can't help but tug insistently at Stiles earlobe, the slap Derek receives on his chest proof of how much Stiles hates the action. It makes Derek snicker.

"I'll go get some more sunscreen and the cooler, okay?"

"You're the best," Stiles smiles dopily, like getting Derek to be the one to go back to the car wasn't his plan all along. Derek just rolls his eyes and carefully dislodges himself from Stiles, who curls up like a cat on the vacated area on the towel where Derek had been laying. It shouldn't make Derek feel fond, he thinks when looking back at the mans lanky form, but dammit if it doesn't make warmth spread down to his fingers and toes.

There isn't any sense of rushing though, finding himself enjoying the backdrop of strangers milling about, everyone languid in the heat and raucous with joy, seagulls flying overhead like tiny guards on watch. Once upon a time Derek never would have made time for this, never would have found peace in finding quiet amongst such flurry of activity, always willing to write-off frivolity or finding it unbearable to be around others. Maybe it's age, maybe he's just worked through some things, Derek doesn't really know, but he cares less nowadays about the little things and more about protecting what he already has. _Don't sweat the small stuff,_  his parents would say, which would never fail to make Derek feel dubious, it always felt like nothing more than a platitude. He thinks he understands that notion a lot better now.

When he reaches the car he makes quick work of retrieving the cooler from the back seat but struggles to find the sunscreen, locating it under the drivers seat after a few minutes of searching. When he reaches the shore again with the items, barely dodging a pair of children sprinting by, he spots Stiles lying face down on the towel, head rested on his outstretched arms. _That idiot_ , Derek thinks - he's only going to get his legs and arms more sunburnt - and then it's going to be Derek who has to hear the complaining about the pain and all of the ensuing gross skin peeling. From about ten feet away Derek lobs the bottle of sunscreen at his boyfriend, feeling immensely satisfied when it hits Stiles square on the ass, causing him to squawk in surprise and quickly sit up to scan the area. When Stiles catches sight of Derek he glares daggers, throwing up his middle finger.

They've come a really long way since their reconciliation a year ago. 

No, really. It was by no means easy or without further fights, but they have managed to work out a lot of their problems and insecurities. It took a lot of talking, like a _lot_. That, and a lot of time away from both their families to be alone together, and a whole lot of patience on both sides - which said something, considering that patience wasn't really a quality that either Derek or Stiles had in spades. But they've been able to get to a place where it feels even better than it did before it all went bad, it feels like Derek understands both himself and Stiles a lot more - it finally feels like they're on the same team again, which Derek missed most of all. His family is great but Derek needs Stiles in his corner, not on the other side of the ring. He got his best friend back.

"Dumbass," Derek greets upon his return, indicating with a finger for Stiles to turn around on the towel so that he faces the water.

"Asshole," Stiles returns, poking out his tongue as he does as he's told and turns around, sitting cross-legged. Derek sets the cooler on the ground nearby and goes to sit behind him, his own legs pressed against the small of Stiles' back as he opens the cap and begins applying sunscreen to Stiles hands from behind, pressing his fingers along Stiles palm in a light massage. He drops a kiss to Stiles neck as he works his way with the lotion up Stiles forearms, digging his thumbs into the muscle and taking satisfaction in the way Stiles shoulders seem to relax. Sometimes Derek can't believe that they get to have this - after all the animosity, after all the hurt, that they are in fact stronger than they were before. It wasn't easy for Derek to convince himself to trust Stiles again with his heart or his dreams, and they fought a lot in the early days, their lives so different and with so much still unresolved between them. But once they worked through it all and let go some of the fear everything fell back into a rhythm. Now they live together, watch Netflix in bed under the sheets while their bodies are pressed against each other - they both have new jobs they don't hate, they cook and clean and have neighbours they do hate, sometimes they go on long drives on the weekends and sometimes they go to the beach.

It's not perfect.

Derek's still the happiest he's ever been, though. He thinks Stiles might be too.

Once Derek is done rubbing the sunscreen into Stiles arms and neck he passes the tube along for Stiles to do his face, leaning back to grab some items out of the cooler. Dipping his hand into the frigid ice-water feels nice against his own heated skin as he grabs a couple of water bottles and wrapped sandwiches. He passes a cold bottle of water over Stiles shoulder.

"Want this?" Derek asks, shaking it lightly to grab Stiles attention. Stiles makes an affirmative noise and grabs the slippery bottle with sunscreen-slick hands. 

"Ooh yeah, thank you."

Next, Derek passes over a wrapped ham-cheese sandwich over his shoulder. They made them this morning with the good, expensive bread that Stiles loves. "And this?"

"Hell yes," Stiles affirms as his stomach growls, taking it and dropping it into his lap before taking a long drink from his water bottle. He's ripping into the plastic surrounding his sandwich when Derek sticks his hand into his own pocket, tracing along the seams of the small box in there with shaking fingers. His heart is racing so fast and beating so loud that he's sure Stiles must be able to hear it, but Stiles just keeps chewing on his sandwich, none the wiser. Derek needs to swallow a few times, throat dry and voice trembling when he takes the box out of his pocket, opens it, and passes it over Stiles shoulder.

"What about this?" Derek asks nervously.

Heart pounding, Stiles drops his half-eaten sandwich onto his lap and is quiet for a long moment, mostly because he needs to chew and swallow the huge bite he'd taken when Derek asked him the question. Stiles hands come up to take the box from Derek, who is glad to have an excuse to hide the way his skin has gone pale and how his hands still shake.

Stiles turns his head to catch Derek's lips in a sweet kiss. "Yes," he says.

Derek lets out a breath he didn't know he was holding and smiles.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Unplanned epilogue or something. Couldn't let these guys be xo hope you enjoyed.


End file.
